


Before and After

by Rehfan



Category: The Maze Runner (2014), The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Boys Kissing, French Kissing, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, M/M, Suicide Attempt, Underage Kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-28
Updated: 2014-12-28
Packaged: 2018-03-04 00:29:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2902739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rehfan/pseuds/Rehfan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Frypan was Gally's first real friend in the Glade.<br/>Even after he was stung, Frypan always held out hope that his friend would still be there underneath all the anger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before and After

**Author's Note:**

> The details in this story are a combination between book and film and the timeline may be screwy considering Gally's time in the Glade was considerable. Please forgive me. I just had to give Gally a good friend and some tenderness.

Before the Changing, Gally was actually a really cool guy with big ideas. Not that he wasn’t now. It’s just… he’s angrier. Frypan didn’t know what to do about it. He just watched Gally go about his business and he couldn’t help but notice that even the way he stood was different. He was more hunched in the shoulders. Not so much that anyone would notice, but enough that Frypan did. He watched him move across the Glade and over to the eastern wall. He once told Frypan that he’d love to tear down the walls of the Maze, to free all the Gladers. Now Frypan watched him as he ordered his builders to patch up a part of the wall that had crumbled away. He shook his head and went back to his kitchen.

 

~080~

 

“Hungry, Greenie?” asked Frypan to the new kid. He hadn’t remembered his name yet, but he hoped he was hungry. Hungry meant there was hope. He paused to consider where he had heard those words before, but he shrugged it off in the end as a pre-Maze thing. No sense in wracking your brain when it came to familiar clunk from before the box. “What you in the mood for?”

“I don’t know,” he said softly as if the volume of his voice would somehow make this place real.

“You’re pretty quiet for a big fella,” said Frypan, friendly as you please. “Will you eat meat? Some of the boys said they didn’t want to when they first came.”

“Yeah,” said the new boy quietly.

Frypan sat next to him on the grass outside the kitchens. “It takes a few days to adjust. You’ll get used to the place. Learn our rules. Alby’s the leader - that’s the kid that pulled you out of the box. Newt’s his second-in-command. You got a skill, we’ll find it. They’ll send you around to all of us, one by one. Then you’ll be placed based on what you do best. See? Simple.” He bumped the boy with his arm encouragingly. “Now, let’s get you something to eat.”

The boy’s eyes were crystalline blue and scared as anything. Frypan had never seen anything like them.

“Okay,” he said and pulled himself to his feet.

“I’m Franklin, by the way,” he said, extending his hand, “but everyone just calls me Frypan.”

“I- I don’t remember-”

“It’s okay,” said Frypan. “That comes back in time. Let’s get you set up. Hope you like sloppy joes.”

 

~080~

 

“Dammit, lift it higher, you shucks!” yelled Gally. He was sweating in the effort it took to move the heavy stone against the wall. Their levers were almost to the point of busting when Frypan came over to them.

“Dinner’s on, shuckfaces,” he called.

Gally turned to glare at him. “We’ll be there when we’re done.”

Frypan stared at the back of Gally’s head for a long moment. “It’s sloppy joes,” he said.

“When we’re done, Fry!” yelled Gally again, his voice barely containing his annoyance. “Come on and push, you pieces of clunk!”

At his word, the whole team heaved and the stone tipped over and against the wall, sliding into place just where Gally and the team had wanted it to go. No one moved until Gally checked the sides of her to make sure the stone hadn’t cracked or split. “She’s good,” he said. “Go eat.”

No sooner were the words out of his mouth then the whole group of builders ran off toward the kitchen for some grub. Gally was the last to leave the site.

“Gonna build another maze inside the Glade?” asked Frypan, half-seriously.

Gally admired the stone and backed away from it wiping his hands on his shirt. “No, just trying to reinforce the one we have.”

“Do you remember when you said you wanted to get out of here?”

Gally stared at him hard for a long time. “I didn’t know what I was talking about.” He pushed past Frypan and headed toward the kitchen. “This is the only place we need.”

 

~080~

 

“I remember my name!” he announced and the whole group let out a cheer. They remembered what that feeling was like. It was a burden not to have a name for yourself; to finally find it was a miracle. “Yeah?” asked Newt, “So what is it then?”

“Gall- eh… Gally,” he said. “It’s Gally.”

“GALLY!” A shout went up throughout the Glade. Gally beamed at all of them. His eye caught Frypan’s and he smiled even brighter.

“Alright, Gally,” said Alby. “After breakfast you’ll get started around here. Everyone gets a job. No one lazes about in the Glade. You earn your keep here.”

Gally nodded at Alby seriously. He was too happy to care about what work he would be given that day. He was just happy to know himself - if only a little. He went over to Frypan who was shaking his head and giggling. “Nice to meet you, Gally,” he said and stuck his hand out again, “My name’s Franklin but you can call me-”

“Frypan,” said Gally and took his hand and shook it.

 

~080~

 

He didn’t sleep next to him anymore. He said it was because Frypan always had to get up so early to feed everyone. It disturbed him when he got up. He didn’t like losing any more sleep than he had to. And he was lousy with nightmares after the Changing. The first night Gally was back with them, the spidery veins of the Changing were fading off but the haunted look in Gally’s eyes was still there. Frypan knew that he would never be the same, but it didn’t matter; he wanted him back. He watched Gally and waited for any sign that they would be okay, that the things between them wouldn’t change. And then Gally did the unthinkable: he climbed the Maze wall and tried to jump.

Frypan practically ran up the wall after him. Others tried to stop him but he kicked them off. He kept climbing. Others were shouting and scrambling for the netting woven from rope and the ivy vines that they used to shelter the pigs out of the sun.

He heard Newt shout: “If he’s going to fall, let him be caught in the bloody net!” And still Frypan kept climbing. He could see Gally’s tears on his cheeks from where he stood above him. Frypan’s hands were used to the flame of cooking but not the roughness of the stone walls like Gally’s were and he could feel the gravelly surface digging into his skin with every step.

“Don’t climb any higher, Gally,” begged Frypan, “Please.”

“Get out of here, Fry,” said Gally. Frypan knew that tone: he was acting brave.

“You know…” panted Frypan, his mind racing for the right thing to say, “I really hate heights. Did you know that, man?”

Gally just stared down at him from the small ledge just above his head and out of reach. His mouth was set in a firm line, but his eyes were the same ones he saw on the first day he came into the Glade.

“So if I’m all the way up here for your shucking butt,” he continued, “then it must mean I love you or something, right?”

A fat tear rolled down Gally’s face. “Shut up.”

“So if I love you, then you have to come down, don’t you? Because, why would you want to hurt me too? Right?” said Frypan.

Gally wiped at his cheeks with the back of his hand. “Stop it, Frypan. You don’t know anything, alright?”

“Then why don’t you come down and explain it to me?”

Gally stared at him and then sat down suddenly and hard against the ledge. Everyone below took a collective gasp. “There’s no point to this,” he said. “There’s no point to any of it. If we don’t play their game… do what they want… they’ll leave us alone.”

“What the shucking hell are you talking about, Gal?” said Frypan. “I need more information than that.” He kept climbing until he was even with the ledge. There was barely enough room to sit and just enough room for the two of them, but Frypan took a deep breath as the expanse of the Glade loomed out in front of them. He tried not to look down and pressed his back against the wall. “Shucking hell this is scary, Gally. Please come down with me, okay? Please?”

“Then why did you come up here?” asked Gally slowly.

“I told you: because I love you.” He looked at Gally desperately. Slowly, the troubled boy met his eyes.

“Oh, Frankie,” he said and began to sob. “Please let me go. I have to go. This place… I can’t, Frankie.”

Frypan took his hand. “Not without me.”

They sat up there not saying anything for the better part of an hour until finally, numbly, Gally lowered himself to the ground with Frypan following. Once there, the two boys clung to each other until well after sunset.

 

~080~

 

“Builders, eh?” said Frypan as he served up some more bacon to Gally. “Congratulations.”

“Yeah,” said Gally, digging into his scrambled eggs. “I have big ideas for this place.”

“So you’re settling in alright?”

“So far,” he said around a mouthful. “Just wish the sleeping quarters were better. Gonna work on that first.”

“Are you?” said Frypan with a half-smile. “Gonna build us a hotel in the Glade?”

“Sure,” said Gally smiling. “No… seriously. We need something better than laying in the grass with blankets or the over-crowded Homestead.”

“Why?” asked Frypan. The bustle of the kitchen was all around them. He couldn’t really afford to sit across from Gally to rest until the last pan was scrubbed, but Frypan had plenty of boys to help him and they were always asking him to take a break every once in a while. He leaned onto the table and watched Gally enjoy his breakfast. “What’s so bad about sleeping on the ground? The patch I’ve got is relatively soft and good enough for me. Anything more comfortable, I’m likely to miss prepping for breakfast for all you shucks.”

Gally chuckled at that. “How about a hammock instead?”

Frypan considered it. “It would save me from crawling up off the ground every morning.”

“And save the blankets and pillows from getting filthy all the time.”

“Save the sloppers from all the washing all the time. Blankets are heavy when wet.”

Gally nodded. It was a good idea. Frypan was happy to see him latch on to a purpose. There was a time when he didn’t think the Greenie was going to have a reason to be. A fella needed a job to do in the Glade otherwise he’d just go shucking crazy. And crazy is no fun place to be. May as well just walk into the Maze and let the doors close behind you.

 

~080~

 

“What are you doing with all those apples?” asked Frypan.

“Just trying something,” said Gally. “Besides, they’re not fresh anymore. I’m cutting away all the soft bits and leaving the rest.”

“You didn’t ask my permission,” said Frypan frowning at him. “And that’s my good paring knife too.”

Gally winked at him. “You’re going to like this, Fry. Trust me.”

Frypan watched him carefully as he placed the fruit into a small press that WCKD had given them and discarded all the soft and spoiled bits. He juiced the fruit, added some culture starter and salt. He screwed it into a mason jar and held it up. “In a few days, this’ll be perfect,” said Gally.

“Oh you think so?” said Frypan. “And where did you learn how to do that?”

Gally stopped and shrugged. “I just know.” He looked at Frypan with an expression of confusion. Every Glader got that from time to time. Frypan thought about it like this: every Glader’s brain was wrapped in cheesecloth; every once in a while an old memory leaked through. Not a big enough memory to grasp fully, but something that happened on instinct. And there was always a combination of relief and fear that followed: relief that they remembered anything from before the Glade, and fear that they forgot it in the first place. And the fear opened up an even bigger can of worms. Thoughts about who they were before and what they knew. Thoughts about where they came from and if there was anyone outside the Maze who missed them. Gladers could go crazy from those thoughts.

Frypan always felt a big swell of empathy for Gladers who had a bit of old slip through the cheesecloth. And Gally’s big blue eyes always got to him anyway. Frypan sat next to him, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “You want to make some more?” He nodded toward a big barrel of apples in the corner. “About nine apples to a jar, right?” Gally nodded and they spent the rest of the evening making Gally’s secret recipe.

In three days they had another bonfire - only this time every Glader had a taste of Gally’s concoction. It was the best bonfire night they’d had in the history of ever.

 

~080~

 

The last hammock was hung and everyone cheered. They couldn’t wait to go to sleep that night. Gally took many pats on the back from Gladers and Keepers alike. Frypan made sure he was one of the last to offer his congratulations. “Now which one’s which?” he asked.

“Take your pick, but I thought…” he crooked a finger at him, encouraging him to follow. He led him to the eastern side of the structure and a hammock made of thick canvass, a bit wider than the others. Gally held out a hand toward it. “Eastern light first thing in the morning won’t let you sleep in. Also, no western exposure so you can get some rest early.”

Frypan shook his head and laughed. “Looks perfect,” he said. “Where are you?”

“Right here,” said Gally, patting the hammock just next to it. “I hope you don’t snore.”

“I hope you don’t talk in your sleep and keep me awake,” Frypan countered.

Gally got really close to Frypan, his nose just a centimeter away from his own. “I bet you drool.”

Frypan wasn’t a guy to be intimidated. “I bet you wet the bed.”

“Yeah well,” said Gally, “I bet you fall out on the first night and wake all of us up.”

Frypan delighted in the playful light in Gally’s eyes. “I bet you need a kiss goodnight so the shucking boogeyman doesn’t get you.”

Gally’s smirk faded into something else at that. His eyes flicked to Frypan’s mouth and back again. It was quick, but both boys saw it happen. “Bet you’re a lousy kisser.”

“Bet you I’m not,” he said.

There was a long pause as the boys stood there together. Gally looked around a bit, not moving his head away. Gladers had drifted off and back to their chores, the builders were all arguing over where they wanted their hammocks. No one paid them any attention. Gally kissed him.

Frypan thought he would be too scared to let it happen; that he would reflexively jerk back and it would be awkward and weird and all his fault. But it wasn’t that way at all. Instead it was awkward and weird all on its own but he had held his ground and the kiss lingered for a few more seconds than was strictly appropriate for “just friends”. Turns out they were both pretty good kissers for such a simple kiss. Those big blue eyes of Gally’s took Frypan’s reaction in carefully; he looked scared and uncertain again. Frypan smiled. Then Gally smiled. And then the awkward weirdness was gone - just like that.

 

~080~

 

“Goodnight, Gally,” said Frypan on his way to the hammocks for some shut-eye. “Greenie in the morning,” he added.

Gally nodded at him and watched him go, having more chores to do before he could rest for the night. There was a patch of wood that needed to be cleared and used for lumber and he was guiding everyone in stacking it all just before the daylight vanished for good. As he watched the back of his best friend, he felt a pull toward him. The stack of wood behind him fell in a clumsy pile, waking him from his reverie. “You slintheads,” he yelled. “Stack it like I told you.” It would be another twenty minutes before he got cleaned up and went to bed himself.

“You hoping for another builder?” asked Frypan once Gally had settled in for the night. Their hammocks were side by side and sometimes bumped each other when they were getting in and out. If Frypan wanted to, he could have pushed against the material and brushed up against Gally’s arm. They used to do that sort of thing all the time, before the Changing. Now Frypan had to play his cards just right to get a smile from him. It wasn’t fair.

“Yeah,” said Gally, “we need one with brains. But you watch: it’ll be just another slintheaded slopper.”

“Hey,” said Frypan, “go easy on the sloppers. They’ve got to put up with the rest of us. Besides, I remember when you were so scared that you’d wind up a slopper.”

“I never did,” said Gally, annoyed.

Frypan laughed and shook his head. “You did. You looked up at me after you finished your breakfast and told me that you hoped something clicked because you didn’t want to be a slopper.”

“I don’t remember that,” said Gally.

“I do.”

Gally sat up a bit. “You know what? You’re always remembering this and remembering that. Shuck it, you probably remember the day you were born and don’t want to tell the rest of us. I wish you’d shut up about all those things you remember about me.” Gally lay back down and rolled away from him. “Leave me alone. You don’t want to know what I remember.”

Frypan was quiet for a long time. “I’m sorry, Gally,” he whispered to the dark. “I just miss you is all.”

“I’m right here,” he mumbled back.

“No, Gally,” said Frypan with a finality that choked him up. “No, you’re not. Haven’t been for a long time. I miss you.”

Frypan was woken in the middle of the night by soft sobbing coming from the hammock next to him. He reached out a hand and found Gally’s and held it, feeling Gally squeezing back intermittently until sleep took him.

 

~080~

 

It was the first time Gally had ever seen anyone stung. But then, he was still the newest one in the Glade after Charlie. He hadn’t been there as long as some of the others who had seen Justin, Aiden, and Stephen all get sent to the Maze. Frypan was party to the last one. It was a miserable task, shoving a Glader you’d known for weeks or even months into the closing maw of the doors. Frypan shivered at the recollection.

“What happened to him?” asked Gally, those blue eyes of his wide with fear and questions. He had come running across the Glade. Everyone else had dropped what they were doing to watch the boy being carried in from the Maze between two other runners. He was unconscious and his injury could have been a slip and fall, but the Gladers who had seen it before, knew.

“He was stung,” said Frypan quietly. “Grievers. They stayed in the Maze too long.” As he spoke those words, the doors slid closed with a boom.

Gally slipped an arm around Frypan. Frypan laid his arm across Gally’s shoulders and squeezed him comfortingly. “Will he die?”

Frypan looked at Gally and said softly: “He will once he’s put back into the Maze.”

“What?”

Frypan sighed and explained the Changing to the best of his knowledge. He knew that they had no choice in the matter, but some lived and some got worse and there was no telling how it was going to fall for the stung Glader. “They’ll see him through the worst of it and hope he comes out the other side,” said Frypan. “If he doesn’t… we give them to the Maze. Let the doors close on ‘em.”

“Has anyone survived being stung?”

“A couple, but they were never right again. They were never the same people. That’s why we call it the Changing.”

Gally was quiet for a long time and both boys watched as the runners struggled with their burden, their brother.

Frypan leaned in and bumped his forehead to Gally’s temple. “Just don’t go out into the Maze, Gally. It’s one of the three solid rules we got.” He nodded toward where the medjacks were carrying the limp body to the Homestead building where a few of the Gladers still slept and where the sick were treated. “I’d hate to think of you like that.”

“But the Grievers only attack near the close of the Maze doors, right?”

“True,” said Frypan. “Doesn’t mean that the Maze is a safe place at any other time.” He turned to face Gally. “Promise me you won’t go into the Maze. Besides, you don’t want to spend any time in the Slammer for it if you do survive. They usually don’t give you much more than bread and water - if anything at all.”

“Well that seals it,” Gally said with a small smirk. “What would I do without your sloppy joes?” Frypan smiled and Gally kissed him again, softly, slowly. “I’m not going anywhere, Frankie.”

 

~080~

 

They were walking through the wooded part of the Glade everyone called the Deadheads. Gally had heard about the graves that were here, but he had never ventured in. He had been asking Frypan for ideas as to how to get out, how to tear this place down, how to leave. He suggested going down the shaft that the Box came up but Frypan just shook his head and told him to take a walk to the Deadheads. That he would find his answer there.

The grave wasn’t hard to miss. The body inside was unforgettable. Some kind of plexi or glass was covering the top of the mound and allowed a clear view of what was inside: half of a boy.

“His name was Alan,” said Frypan from behind him. “He was desperate to get out and came up with the crazy scheme to go down the shaft. That had to be the first or second week he was here.” Frypan stepped closer but not so close as to be able to see Alan’s remains. “It was his idea, so we had him go first. Alby was dead set against it. Turns out he was right. They’ve thought of everything, the creators. Ain’t no getting out of the Maze. Ain’t no leaving the Glade.”

“But how can you give up?” asked Gally. “I- I just…” But there was no use. If he was one of the newest to arrive, what did he know that they haven’t already thought of yet? Gally shook his head. “I want to go home, Frankie.”

Frypan walked to his friend, took him by the arm, and led him away from the graves and deeper into the wood. “This is home, Gally.”

“I don’t understand why we were put here.”

“Neither does anyone else,” said Frypan. “Shuck it, if we had even a clue, don’t you think we would have known what to do? Or better than that: wouldn’t we have told you what was going on when you got here? No. We haven’t got a single idea. And we haven’t got a way out. We just do the best we can and pray that the runners figure out enough of the Maze to find a door the creators forgot about. Somewhere that we can all run to to leave this place.”

Gally looked up at the trees. There was no breeze in the Glade. No rain either. He wondered about that a lot but he didn’t say anything to Frypan. He just wrapped him up in a warm hug and stood there, the other boy’s arms around his waist and squeezing comfortingly. “Sorry, Frankie,” said Gally softly. “I don’t mean to be trouble.”

“Hey,” said Frypan, “we all had questions in the beginning. But here you are now, a job to do, accomplished Builder and all. There’s even talk of making you a Keeper. Craig might step down because he says you’re the better builder than him. Did you know?”

“No,” said Gally, surprised. “No foolin’?”

“Nope,” said Frypan, grinning. Gally grinned back and kissed him.

They were quite alone in the wood, the sounds of the Glade echoing back to them off the walls and through the trees, but no shout went up looking for them. Gally slid his tongue inside Frypan’s mouth carefully before breaking their second-ever kiss. “Wow…” Frypan remarked.

“Yeah,” said Gally, a little breathlessly. They kissed again and allowed themselves the luxury of not being seen to enjoy it, to enjoy the feel of each other in their arms, to act as if they had all the time in the world to stand there and explore each other with hands and tongues, breath hitching and heat spreading low in their bellies.

 

~080~

 

It hadn’t hurt at first. It was as if his body didn’t want to register that he’d been hit. As soon as it was over, someone (Minho?) was cursing at him, dragging him away. All he had wanted was some of the crumbling stone from the inner walls of the Maze. It was a straight shot from the entrance to the rocks he had seen. It would have only taken him a moment. He didn’t think about the time of day, only the stones. They were bigger than he thought and he got the first one back into the Glade without any trouble. The second one was a lot heavier. He struggled with it, dropping it at one point. When he stooped to pick it back up…

It was in front of him in seconds, dripping a sticky, slimy, saliva from its jaws. And it just stung him. Just like that. He found out later that if he hadn’t been holding the massive stone in front of his chest and belly, that it would have been certain death. As it was, he was stung in the thigh, on the outside of the muscle, a superficial wound at best, but enough to matter.

He didn’t see the sun for almost a week.

When he did wake, it was to Frypan spoon-feeding him soup. He was tied to the bed. It was almost as bad as the dreams. “Don’t struggle. And don’t try to speak,” said Frypan. His voice sounded far away. He obeyed and swallowed each spoonful as it was given to him, studying the concern in the other boy’s eyes and trying to wipe the memories from his mind: the water tanks, the screaming as the faces stared at him from behind the glass, technical, clinical faces; faces that weren’t interested in getting him free. Faces that were studying him, watching him, evaluating him. And one boy in particular…

Soon enough, all the soup was consumed and one of the medjacks came in to estimate his healing. He nodded satisfactorily and loosened Gally’s bonds. He rubbed his wrists and tried to sit up only to find Frypan’s hand on his shoulder pushing him down. “Easy, Gal,” he said. “It’s all okay. You’ve been here a while. You’re lucky to be here at all.”

“I remember, Frankie,” he said wearily, tearing up. “I don’t know who they were but I don’t want to go back. I can’t go back.” He grabbed Frypan’s shirt and fisted it, bringing the boy closer. “We can never leave here, Frankie. It’s not safe out there anymore. It’s not. Please.” He was crying but he didn’t care.

Frypan held him fast and climbed on the straw-stuffed mattress with him, letting the other boy cry until he was asleep again. He lay there, listening to the Glade calm down as the sun set on yet another day. The fading light softened Gally’s features and Frypan laid there a long time, stroking his hair and listening to his gentle breathing, grateful that he was alive and terrified of what he would become.


End file.
